


foolish is the man who wears the crown

by ghostbythesea



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arthur Dayne Lives, Canon-Typical Behavior, Daeron Lives, Everyone Needs A Hug, F/M, Jon Snow is Azor Ahai, Jon Snow is a Targaryen, M/M, Ned Stark needs a Hug, R Plus L Equals J, Viserys Targaryen Lives
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:28:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25894411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostbythesea/pseuds/ghostbythesea
Summary: Prince Daeron Targaryen, the second-born son of King Aerys II, survives his infancy. Ser Arthur Dayne, rather than being killed outside the Tower of Joy, is taken as a hostage of House Stark of Winterfell.Everything changes, and yet nothing’s really different.
Relationships: Arthur Dayne/Ned Stark, Catelyn Stark/Ned Stark
Kudos: 13





	foolish is the man who wears the crown

**Author's Note:**

> Here’s another work in progress, oops. This one should be completed in the next... month, or so? I just figured I’d post it now, and update it later when the next chapter’s finished. I have the third mostly done, but I want to post the second chapter before the third. Come visit me at @gay-poster-child if you want to make a request!

“Viserys,” Daeron said gently, reaching across the table to carefully take his younger brother’s hand in his own, “you need to eat something. Are you feeling seasick?”

Viserys, with a flushed face and tears gathering in his eyes, shook his head solemnly. The day that they’d set sail from Dragonstone, he hadn’t stopped crying, and in the long, exhausting days that followed, his moods had swung between resentful and sorrowful. “This is _gross_ , Daeron,” he mumbled, poking the thick soup in front of them with his spoon.

“I’ll eat it, then,” Daeron assured him, taking his bowl. He’d intended on skipping his own dinner to save the rations for Ser Willem and the children, and because he hardly ever felt like eating regardless, but he wasn’t going to force Viserys to eat it, nor would he waste the food. Daeron himself was barely fourteen years, although he was almost a man grown. Fourteen, and already feeling thrice his own age. “Would you rather have dried venison, or fish? We have plenty of both.”

They didn’t, but Viserys didn’t need to know that.

“The fish, please,” Viserys mumbled, “thank you.”

Standing, Daeron’s legs were unsteady, but he knew that he could manage. He knew that it was his father’s paranoia that had rendered him bedridden, not his own fragility, although his health had been poor since his childhood. The curse of inbreeding, he supposed. Walking forwards, he pushed through the door to the storage room, supporting himself on the crates of food inside. He needed to get a cane of sorts, he knew, but that could wait until they’d made it to shore.

There were strips of cured pike in a crate, and he grabbed one, knowing that Viserys, having not yet reached his seventh name day, wouldn’t have the appetite for much more. It was good, he supposed, that three children could only eat as much as an adult together. Plating it on a wooden dish, he headed back into the galley, sitting down with a shaky sigh.

When he placed the food in front of his brother, Viserys took to the fish much easier, although by the way the boy kept glancing at him and picking at his fish, Daeron supposed he was simply trying to please him by eating. Daeron took a spoonful of the pea soup, and nearly gagged. He could see why Viserys hadn’t been willing to eat more than a bite. Nonetheless, he shoveled more into his mouth, and silently prayed that there would be better food in Essos.

“Daeron,” Viserys mumbled, staring down at his food, “when are we going home?”

“We aren’t going back to Westeros,” Daeron said carefully. His younger brother could have quite the temper, sometimes, although he never got violent with them. It was understandable, considering everything that had happened, but Daenerys had finally fallen asleep, and he wouldn’t have a tantrum from Viserys waking her, not before he napped, too. “Our family is our home. This ship is our home, too, until we reach Essos. And then, home is wherever we want it to be.”

“But I want to go back to King’s Landing,” Viserys protested.

Even Daeron could parse that he simply wanted their mother. He wanted their elder brother, and their goodsister, and the niece and nephew that Daeron had begged to come with them to Dragonstone. “We cannot undo our brother’s mistakes, but we can learn to live with their consequences.”

Damn Rhaegar, kidnapping a girl for the sake of a prophecy and dooming the rest of them with him.

The answer didn’t satisfy his brother, but it wouldn’t have satisfied Daeron, if he’d been in his place. He doubted he’d be able to satisfy him without giving him false promises that he wouldn’t be able to keep. “None of this is fair. Why should we be banished for what our brother did?”

Because Robert Baratheon wasn’t above slaughtering children.

If they’d stayed, it could’ve been Viserys stabbed a dozen times, and Daenerys with her head caved in from being smashed against a wall. Daeron wouldn’t have minded his own death if it’d been a choice between him and his siblings, but instead, they’d fled across the Narrow Sea for safety with Ser Willem in the Free Cities, where Baratheon’s men couldn’t hurt them.

“The first thing you must learn,” Daeron said, leaning forwards across the wooden table, “is that the squabbles of men are rarely fair. There is no just reason we have been exiled, but we are lucky to have what we do.”

Viserys watched him warily, trying to then nodded. He finished his fish, setting his fork down on his plate and pushing it away from him across the table. “Can I hold Dany again?” He asked, peering at the staircase of the boat that led down into the bedroom below, where their sister would be sleeping in the wooden box that’d been fashioned into a makeshift cradle.

“When she’s awake, yes,” Daeron said, supporting himself on the table as he stood, moving around towards Viserys. Putting a gentle hand on the boy’s back, he led them around the table towards the stairs. He was glad that they had a railing, or he doubted he would be able to climb them without moving on his hands and knees. “For now, we should sleep while we can.”

“Alright,” Viserys said, although Daeron could tell that he was unhappy with the agreement.

When they reached their bedroom below, he checked to ensure their sister was still breathing and asleep, before settling down on the edge of their cot and helping Viserys into bed with him. He tugged off the boots his brother wore to prevent him getting splinters from the wooden floor, and when he’d removed his own, they rolled into bed together, Viserys nestled in the crook of his arm.

“Daeron, could you sing Jenny of Oldstones for me again?” Viserys asked quietly, pressing his face into Daeron’s shoulder. It’d been the song that Rhaegar had loved to play on his harp when they were younger, although with Daeron’s illness and their father’s protectiveness over Viserys, they’d rarely been in the same room together as children. “It helps me sleep.”

“Of course,” Daeron said, shifting so that he could lean over his brother. Viserys pulled their moth-bitten blanket towards his chest, staring up at Daeron with familiar amethyst eyes. He wetted his lips, wishing he had an instrument to play, but Viserys had enjoyed it well enough when he’d sung it the last two nights they’d been on the boat. “ _High in the halls of the kings who are gone_ ,” he started singing softly to him, combing his fingers through his younger brother’s long, pale hair, “ _Jenny would dance with her ghosts..._ ”

Viserys fell asleep quickly, but Daeron finished the song regardless. He wondered about Rhaegar’s last moments, if he had time to regret everything he’d done, or if his death he come quickly. Daeron didn’t consider himself cruel, but a small, vindictive part of him hoped that Rhaegar suffered for the misery he’d put the rest of them through. His mindless pursuit of his own desires led them all to misery.

From the bed, he could watch Daenerys’ chest rising and falling with each shallow breath, the princess hardly three days of age and sleeping in the cradle of a lowborn girl. They were the three surviving children of Aerys II, the three that the Gods had decided would survive to see their family cast from their throne and exiled, and he would ensure that they would survive.

It was his birthright to sit on the Iron Throne, with his brother and his children and their father now dead, but he didn’t want any of it. He simply wanted to see his brother happy, and his sister survive to reach womanhood. If he needed to surrender his inheritance or his own life to see his family safe, he would gladly do so. After all, he wasn’t supposed to survive infancy.   
  



End file.
